


Reve de Rouge

by prophet_of_troy



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Blood and Gore, Creature Fic, Dark, Death, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Masquerade, Mental Breakdown, What is real?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-29
Updated: 2020-09-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:15:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26712037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prophet_of_troy/pseuds/prophet_of_troy
Comments: 4
Kudos: 6
Collections: Knockturn Tricks or Diagon Treats





	Reve de Rouge

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [KnockturnTricksOrDiagonTreats](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/KnockturnTricksOrDiagonTreats) collection. 



She woke standing in the middle of a sea, shimmering and glittering in the candlelight; but they were people in place of an ocean- each one a stranger with grinning, grotesque masks: and no eyes. She reached up with a jewelled hand to her own face, relieved to feel warm skin in the place of a cool mask, and then chilled by anxiety at the unfamiliar sight of her own hands. She didn’t recognize the bracelet, or the ring smirking back at her; and looking down at the crimson gown she wore didn’t jolt her memory any more. 

An orchestra played, the melody familiar to her and foreign all at once; swallowing whole the dancers. The gowns rustled as they moved, shoes clicking across the floor. She could feel them looking at her, and the room around her spun in their waltz without any hint that they saw her, that they cared.

The lights cared, boiling her with the candles lit around the room to give it a bright, warm glow. The heat in her face made her breath come out in short, panicked pants and there was a heaviness to her inhalation as though she  _ were _ wearing such a mask. The room was breathless. Breathless because it didn’t appear that anyone breathed. How could they, when the very air was suffocating?

When the very air pulsed with a sense of hysterical passion.

Arms plucked her from the crowd, grabbing her firmly around the waist and pulling her into the dance. She and the faceless stranger melted into the mass, the atmosphere shifted, and she exhaled with an exhilarated huff. 

_ What a wonderful party _ , a voice whispered in her ear.  _ Wouldn’t you like to stay? _

She felt herself smile, the smile becoming a grin and the grin giving way to a relieved chuckle. She laughed freely, spinning from that stranger to another and watching herself in the mirrored walls as she did. She was looking at the mirror, the light glinting from it, when her vision blurred and she saw the room empty, and dark. 

Her face fell and she floundered back in surprise, whirling to face the masquerade once more. 

Someone pulled her by the arm, their grip tight, and her feet wavered back into the rhythm. Her heart beat half a beat faster, and deep in her abdomen was nestled a lead ball of fear. But when she peered around, eyes looking in every spin, the mirror was just a mirror. 

_ It’s the excitement, _ the voice from before whispered.  _ A trick of the light. Isn’t the music lovely? _

The music. Yes. The aria enveloped her and the candles burned brighter for a moment. She closed her eyes and breathed in relief. Everything was fine. She shifted to the next dancer, spying between them, a few feet away, a silver mask and silvery blonde hair pouring down shoulders from behind it. A figure she knew, and she felt an anxious beat in her heart followed by one of excitement. 

Then he was gone.

She tried looking around for him, but there were so many people and each passing moment seemed to create more of them. The air above was getting heavier with so many, hotter, but she looked for him. 

She left her partner and made her way through the horde, only to see a streak of silver and blonde in the side of her vision. Her stomach lurched. She was afraid of finding him, reaching him, but she wasn’t sure she could make herself not try. There was something deep in her that pulled her blindly to him. She turned to where she saw him go.

_ Blood. Blood standing on the floor like an ocean between her and a crumpled, pulsing pile of faces with no bodies. Blood painted her skin, her hands reaching for more without pause and she couldn’t stop. _

_ Harry.  _

Hermione screamed and stumbled away from the crowd. It was thousands now, the crowd, it had to be. How was the room so big? It wasn’t a moment ago. She tore away from them, backing until she was against the wall. The hole she left in the festivities filled quickly and the merriment went on. 

Her eyes darted about frantically for Harry; her mind supplying a face with dark hair and bright eyes, without any context. Who was Harry? Why did she need to find him? And why did not knowing where or who he was make her sick?

_ Harry isn’t real, pet _ , the Voice said.  _ Perhaps he’s an imaginary friend.  _

No… No, that wasn’t right. Harry was, Harry had to be real.

_ If he’s real, why can’t you remember him? _

Hermione shook violently to herself, frenetic and crashing from an adrenaline rush she couldn’t remember having. Harry was real. She could remember him so clearly until she reached for substance, and only found a shadow where the information used to be.

_ Don’t you want to dance? _

“No,” she whimpered to herself, covering her head, her ears, to shut out the increasing volume of the orchestra. “I don’t want to dance.”

_ The room smelled deliciously like rusty iron. The candles were out, but the dark didn’t bother her. The broken glass bordering the room didn’t give her that natural stab of unease. The mirrors were gone, making the room feel small. But she felt big. No, larger than life. She felt, deific. _

_ And hungry. _

A hand took hers and pulled her out of the dark and back into the warm, sweltering candlelight. He wore a silver mask. It occurred to her as they began dancing that it was the mask she found ghastly. The  _ mask _ which flooded her senses with the need to run away. 

_ But you don’t want to run away from him, do you? _

No, she didn’t. She could feel the stranger smile beneath the mask, the only other pair of eyes in the room. They were blue and cold, making her shudder. 

They didn’t fade back in with the others, but stayed in their intimate corner of the world. He was more natural to her than anything there, more known, and the smallest part of her relaxed. He was there. Everything was going to be fine now. He would make everything okay. The air around her lifted, alleviated, and she could breathe freely once more. She sagged against him and lay her head on his chest as they moved. 

She didn’t mind, she told that piece in her brain that noticed there was no heartbeat. She liked it. She hadn’t felt so safe since she’d awakened in this strange place. But that was exactly what she was as he pulled her closer; a quiet, possessive growling reverberating in his diaphragm as he did. 

_ They had tried to run. The band broke up first, leaving their chords hanging in the air. Then came the screaming and trying to get away only to realize there was nowhere to go. It was beautiful actually, quite beautiful. The expressions of horror followed by the resignation to their fates. The acceptance of what was to come. It put a delighted shiver down her spine and she relished in it.  _

_ She liked to play. _

Her body thrummed with an elation she could feel vibrating in the tips of her fingers. Her hair stood and her skin prickled in anticipation of a kill that never came. The letdown was immediate and the prickling of her skin felt like crawling. The back of her neck went clammy and her breath came out in long whines. His hands gripped her harder to keep her on her feet as she swayed. 

Her eyes squinted through the brightness of the room behind him as he held her up, and her mind told her that that dark head of hair was familiar. She pushed him away feebly and staggered toward the masses at an angle, without so much a look being cast in her direction. 

“Harry!” She called, scared and tense and familiar. His name in her voice was familiar, as was the head of long, red hair with whom he danced. Ginny, she was sure the name was Ginny. 

Neither of them made any move that might show they noticed her presence. 

“Harry?”

She reached forward, tripping when the dance collided with her, and ripped the mask from his face. 

He had no face. There was no face beneath his mask, no anything. Just deep shadow. Just blackness. As if, as she had his mask, so too had his face been ripped viciously from the rest of him. Startled, sick, she took a step away from him, staring and unable to scream. Unable to breathe. 

The mask was red, dripping as she held it. As she watched, the blood climbed her hand, staining her dress and rising up her arms. She dropped it, looking up from her shaking, bloody hands.

Everything had stopped. 

The music was gone, the dancing had ceased, and there were no more masks; a crowd of thousands looking at her with their dark, bleeding empty spaces. Their skins seemed to be melting into their opulent attire.

Screams filled her ears, but there was no sound in the dimming ballroom, and no mouths for anyone to scream with but her. A waxy figure seized her by the hair, tugging her into the centre of them where more hands clawed at her; leaving oozing gashes that she couldn’t feel. Their brightly coloured jewels liquefied with the rest of them to a puddle, a pool of red. 

A cry tore out of her, desperate and anguished. It ruptured from her throat in a strangled, gurgling sound. The safe man was gone. Gone. He had left her. 

_ It’s alright,  _ the Voice said, soothing and smooth and out of place even in her own mind.  _ Everything’s going to be alright……….. _ _   
_ _   
_ __ *

Everything was red; the curtains, the walls, her hands and her face. There was something slick on and around her mouth, or maybe she had no mouth anymore, but when she lifted her fingers to where her mouth should be and drew them away again; they too were red.

“It's alright,” a voice told her entirely too loud. 

Her eyes quickly took in the room again, all the red and the one blonde flash against it. Her first instinct was to run; or perhaps to attack. But the thought of hurting him shot its own painful surge through her chest. 

“Shh, sh, sh, sh, sh,” came the next sound from the man. Thing. A whisper in her head told her this was no man, but perhaps some sort of animal or beast. “It's alright, my pet. Come with me. We'll get you taken care of. Everything will be fine, I promise, but we must leave now.”

Everything he said made an absolute sense as he spoke, calming her and leaving her in a blissful state of equally absolute trust. 

“Okay.” The sound seemed just as foreign as the ones before it, and it took her a few seconds to realize that it was her own voice she wasn't recognizing. She felt herself frown, feeling confused at how strange it all felt. It was as though everything was new and familiar at the same time. “I-I-”

“Come, pet, before the humans arrive. We must keep you safe.” 

The humans, yes. Humans were dangerous, but she even more so. She could take the humans, and oh!- the fun she could have with their empty, broken corpses. He must have sensed her indignation, taking her hand and she felt another immediate wave of calm. 

“They mustn't know about you just yet.”

“Okay,” she said, realizing only now how bright he seemed in the dark and red room, brighter even when he smiled at her. 

“I must put you to sleep for a while, pet. I know that your mind must feel muddy right now, but I promise it will be better when you wake next. Do you trust me, my pet?”

“Of course I do,” she told him; and then she was asleep again.


End file.
